Pearl Izumi Tour Series | Le Col Cycling

Last night saw the the Tour Series visit The famous venue of Canary Wharf in the heart of London. With the standing so close between ONE Pro Cycling and Madison Genesis there is everything to play for.

As always the pace was fast from the start with riders from all teams trying to break away and the top two teams getting in the mix marking each other closely. After around 15-17mins of racing there was an accident where one of the riders clipped a barrier and came down around 15-20riders back from the front. This caused a split in the main field which was mostly altogether at this point. It was then that the tactics come into play. Regulations state that the team performance on each night is the accumulative time for each 5 riders in each team added together to give a total 'team' time. That then is translated into a team ranking on the night and then points awarded 10 for first on the night down to 1 for 10th on the night.

Madison Genesis opted to drop all 4 remaining riders who were still in the main field back for the one rider who had been held up in the crash believing they were better placed as a team to pace all 5 riders back to the front of the race and maintain the opportunity to win the team round on the night. Given that it was so early on in the race it was a risky strategy and one that didn't pay off. ONE Pro Cycling getting the information from the pits started to ride at the head of the peloton to ensure Madison did not regain contact with the main field, ensuring the team win on the night and closing the gap again in the overall standings to 1 point.

However it's worth pointing out here that with the current regulations it states that the accumulative time on the night is what calculates your position be it by 1sec or 10mins it will still only be 1 point difference between 1st and 2nd teams on the night. Given ONE Pro Cycling were at a 2 point deficit at the beginning of the night to gain one place on Maddison meant only 1 point even if the entire ONE Pro Cycling team lapped the entire Madison team in the process with an aggregate time of over 8mins between them, because Madison were lapping riders from the teams in 3rd and 4th at the same time meaning they still finished 2 team on the night as all other teams had riders lapped more then once.

The points standings are now Madison Genesis 93 ONE Pro Cycling 92 and with two rounds still to race next week it's going to be a nail biting final week. Watch all the coverage on ITV4 Wednesday and Friday night also repeats on Saturday morning and on Eurosport subject to program times.